Albert Hall is a venue used for a variety of entertainment events. It is located in Canberra on Commonwealth Avenue between the Commonwealth Bridge and the Canberra Hotel. The Albert Hall was opened on 10 March 1928 by former Prime Minister Stanley Bruce. At the opening ceremony, he stated that the name for the new entertainment venue was chosen by analogy to the Royal Albert Hall in London, and in honour of the Duke of York, who later became King George VI and proclaimed the establishment of the Commonwealth of Australia - Albert was his first name.
The building is built in the Renaissance style. A canopy in front of the entrance allows visitors arriving by car to get directly inside the building. In the early years after construction, the building was not heated, and until the end of World War II, guest artists were forced to perform in fur coats. In the late 1980s, the Albert Hall was fitted with an organ, which had been in the Odeon Theatre in the United Kingdom from 1933 to 1968.
Before the Albert Hall was built, the largest performance hall in the Federal Capital Territory was the Causeway in the town of Kingston. And in Canberra, it was the largest building that could hold over 700 people until the completion of the Theatre Centre in 1965. Today, the Albert Hall hosts private functions, dances, theatre performances, cultural events and commercial exhibitions.
In February 2007, the government published a plan to develop the Canberra area and its suburbs. Under this plan, the area surrounding the Albert Hall, including Commonwealth Avenue and the open space overlooking Lake Burley Griffin, was to be slightly reshaped. In particular, it was planned that the land around the Albert Hall would be used for commercial purposes - cafes and various tourist services. There was also talk of constructing a building to the north of the Albert Hall. There were heated debates about the proposed changes, and an initiative group was even formed, flooding the city administration with angry protests. Eventually, in April 2007, the government relented - it was decided that the area around the Albert Hall would remain in the public domain, and the building itself was proposed to be added to the National Heritage List to prevent further attempts at restructuring.
